The present invention generally relates to tape cassette loading devices in magnetic recording and/or reproducing apparatuses, and more particularly to a tape cassette loading device applied to a magnetic recording and/or reproducing apparatus, which is designed so that a tape cassette is inserted from a front opening of the apparatus and loaded into a predetermined loading position inside the apparatus.
Generally, a cassette type magnetic recording and/or reproducing apparatus is designed to operate with a cassette which accommodates a magnetic tape (such a cassette will be hereinafter referred to as a tape cassette). In the present specification and the appended claims, a so-called tape cartridge is also included within the scope of the tape cassette. The tape cartridge or cassette is loaded into a predetermined position inside the apparatus. Then, the magnetic tape (cassette tape) is automatically drawn out of the tape cassette and is guided along a predetermined tape traveling path which passes a guide drum, by an automatic tape loading mechanism.
The above automatic tape loading mechanism and the tape cassette have been reduced to practice in video tape recorders. These video tape recorders have been marketed in a large number of countries, and the construction thereof is well known.
When loading the tape cassette into the video tape recorder, the tape cassette is lowered from above the predetermined loading position. Tape draw-out members which intercept the magnetic tape and load the magnetic tape into a predetermined tape trave1ing path, relatively enter inside the tape cassette as the tape cassette is lowered to the predetermined loading position. Conventionally, there was a tape cassette loading device having a cassette holder which is movable up and down. This cassette holder projected from the top plate of the video tape recorder. According to this conventional device, the tape cassette was loaded into the predetermined loading position, by inserting the tape cassette into the cassette holder which projects from the top plate of the video tape recorder, and then manually pushing the cassette holder down together with the tape cassette which is accommodated within the cassette holder.
Recently, a so-called front-loading type video tape recorder has been developed. In the video tape recorder of this type, the tape cassette is partly inserted through an inserting opening which is located in the front of the video tape recorder. The partly inserted tape cassette is automatically drawn inside the video tape recorder, and is loaded into the predetermined loading position by a front-loading type tape cassette loading device.
Examples of the conventional front-loading type tape cassette loading device may be found in the U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,379,313 and 4,320,424. According to the tape cassette loading devices which are disclosed in these patents, the tape cassette which is partly inserted through the inserting opening in the front of the video tape recorder is first moved horizontally and is subsequently moved vertically, as will be described later on in the specification. Thus, there was a problem in that it was difficult to reduce the height dimension of the video tape recorder or design a thin-type video tape recorder. Presently, various means are being devised to reduce the thickness (height) of the video tape recorder. However, it will be extremely difficult to effectively reduce the thickness of the video tape recorder, unless the thickness of the tape cassette loading device is reduced.